A/N: All character thoughts are in italics. Janet owns all recognizable characters, but I'm just borrowing them. Thank you Susan for proofing this – any mistakes belong to solely to me. Did you all catch my boo-boo in the last chapter? I did and fixed it. Anita gave teen-aged Ranger a black eye, not a split lip in Steph's dream memory. The last chapter has been corrected to reflect it. Thanks again for all who keep reading!
Chapter 12
Stephanie moved her arm from her eyes and tried to sit up. Wincing, she grabbed at her sore chest.
"Where's Ranger? I need to know. Is he okay?"
She closed her eyes and tried to remember being safe in his arms. For a moment she swore she could hear the soft steady lub-dub lub-dub lub-dub of his heart beat and that soothed her fraying nerves a little. She looked searchingly in each of her Merry Men's eyes for an answer, but only met blank faces in return.
Panic slowly started to seep into the periphery of her mind. Oh sweet God Ranger please be okay. I need you to be okay. I can't do this without you….. The right side of Stephanie's chest began to burn and tingle and she could almost hear Ranger's voice feather over her saying "I'm okay babe. I'm not going anywhere without you – need you…." She shook her head a little, trying to still what had to be her wistful overactive imagination.
"Steph, calm down." Bobby smiled a half smile at her. "He's in the room next to yours. The injuries that he sustained were remarkably similar to yours. He took the brunt of the fall for you two and popped his head pretty hard." Bobby chuckled. "Guess it's a good thing Ranger's so hard headed – he wound up with a concussion instead of scrambled brains on the side walk."
Stephanie blanched, and grabbed at her stomach. Worry filled her eyes.
"Oh, Jeez. Sorry Steph. Seriously, for the amount of trauma that you both went through, both of your injuries could have been much, much worse. The stick that went through your right thigh went through his left one. He also got hit by the deflected lightning strike and has a pretty good laceration on his shoulder from the fall."
Stephanie visibly relaxed. "So, when can I see him? I feel like –" she paused here, as she carefully chose her words so she didn't sound insane to her friends. "I feel like he needs me to go to him, to see him."
She was met with averted eyes and silence. "Uh, guys?"
Bobby finally looked up at her. "Here's the thing. Ranger's still pretty deep in a coma. He has shown some early indications that he may be starting to come out of it, but the doctors think it's going to take a while. Plus, you really need to be looked over again. The doctors have been waiting until you were more stable neurologically before they did anything with your leg, Steph."
Stephanie nodded slowly, trying to process this. Still nodding, she slowly said, "I don't think I'm going to wait. If I need to be examined, Bobby can do it. I need to get to Ranger. I need to see him, like ten minutes ago."
Tank and Lester looked at each other, then at Bobby and did that silent communication thing that drove her nuts. His face portraying resigned acceptance, Bobby reached over and grabbed Stephanie's hand.
"Okay. Here's what we're gonna do. We need to get your doctor in here to look you over now you're awake. But, I'm gonna see if they will let me monitor you from here on out and just report back to them. You need to do this first and if you get the all clear, we will personally wheel you over to Ranger."
Stephanie's smile lit up the room.
Bobby held his hand up. "Hold up, hot shot. There's one more condition we need to add. We don't think that you should tell anyone else about your dream memories you had – and I mean anyone, Steph. It stays between us four. I really don't want you to say anything to Ranger. We need to figure out how to handle this. Anything else you remember, if you need to talk about it come to either Tank, Les, or me. This is nonnegotiable. As soon as I can, we want to get you discharged and move you into Rangeman."
Bobby watched steam start building behind Steph's eyes as she started to resist.
"Before you start, this is for your safety Steph. Plus, it will let me keep my end of the deal by watching your long term recovery needs. If you say no or fight me on this, you'll have to stay longer in the hospital."
Stephanie sighed as deeply as she could, given how much her chest was tingling, then rolled her eyes.
"Fine. But it's only until I'm completely healed. Now where is this doctor?"
xxxxxxx
"Well, that's the strangest thing."
Bobby waved his hand over the copies of lab results that he had privately run at Rangeman labs that were now spread out on the table in front of him. He turned towards Tank and rubbed the side of his head in puzzlement.
"I've been expecting Steph's blood count to start dropping, as well as for her to experience a type of autoimmune response from the large amount of Ranger's blood that entered her wounds. What the results are showing is that any blood components from Ranger are coexisting in a synergistic manner with hers."
Tank scrunched his eyebrows together. "Try that again in English, Brown."
Bobby rolled his eyes. "In layman's terms, for lack of a better description, it appears that it is actually strengthening her immune system as well as her body's healing properties. I noticed that her wounds have been healing at a remarkable pace but contributed it to the fact that she is young and relatively healthy. The surgeon doesn't think she'll need surgery now on her leg. This is truly remarkable – I've never seen or read about anything like this."
Tank steepled his fingers together and put them up against his mouth in thought. He glanced over to Bobby and said grimly "It is remarkable for her. I wonder if Ranger's blood work will show the same thing." He paused. "If it does, that could be bad news – they'll want to study both of them and write about it in all of those journals you read. We need to keep this on the down low. If Ranger's handler's find out, you do know what they'll do to him, right? Any chance you can lose those blood samples? We can't let them draw any more from either one of them while they're here."
Bobby grimaced. "I have my ways. I can fix this so nothing stands out as unusual." He ran his hand through his hair and sighed. "You know we need to move them both as soon as possible, for their own safety?"
Tank stood up and walked to the door, then paused. "You handle your end and I'll take care of the rest."
xxxxxxx
Tank gently helped Stephanie to sit on the side of her bed. All of the doctors had just finished poking and prodding her, then declared her okay to get up. Her nurse had just left after removing all of her tubes and wires, with the exception of her portable heart monitor. She still felt grungy and wanted a shower desperately, but wanted to go see Ranger first. Tank positioned a wheelchair next to her.
"Okay, Little Girl. You wanna try to move over to the chair, or do you want some help?
Steph attempted to stand up with her weight on her left leg, only to sway and sit back down hard. She dropped her head to her chest and groaned in frustration, then looked up at him. "A little help would be great, Tank."
He gently lifted her by her waist and moved her to the wheelchair, then tucked a blanket over her legs for good measure. He wheeled her out into the hall, where she was greeted with hugs from more of the merry men who were on guard duty outside. Tank paused at the entrance to Ranger's room.
"Before we go in there, Steph, you need to prepare yourself. He still has all of those tubes and wires you just got rid of. He's been twitching off and on, but hasn't opened his eyes or tried to make any noises so far. Everyone keeps telling us to keep talking to him, that he can hear us."
Stephanie nodded solemnly at Tank. "I get it. Take me in there please."
As Tank wheeled her up towards Ranger's head of the bed, Stephanie felt a lump form in her throat. Working hard to push down the tears that threatened to spill out, she hesitantly reached out and trailed her fingers down Ranger's arm until she reached his hand. Needing to keep touching him, she laced her fingers through his.
As she clasped his hand tightly, the tingling and aching in her chest disappeared, much to her relief. She could focus on Ranger now, on the two days' worth of stubble on his handsome face. With her free hand, she gently stroked his cheek, taking comfort in the roughness it created. She leaned in toward him as far as she could.
"Hey," She whispered. "I'm here now. I know this is crazy, but I just felt like you needed me to come to you, you know?"
Stephanie scanned Ranger's body for any signs of movement. Seeing none, she sighed. "You know, this isn't how this scenario is supposed to go. I'm the one who is supposed to be stuck in a stupid hospital bed, unconscious, then wake up to see your face. I feel like this is all my fault that you're hurt. If I hadn't gotten stuck in that damn tree -." She paused, and swallowed hard, trying to keep her throat from closing up with tears. "This really sucks, Ranger."
Steph looked over towards where Tank was standing. Nodding with unspoken understanding, he stepped out of the room.
Huh. I think I just ESP'd Tank. How 'bout that?
She turned her gaze back to Ranger, then scooted up as close as she could next to him. With a little effort and wiggling around, she was able lay her head down next his. Raising their joined hands up to her mouth, she gently kissed the back of his.
"Please come back to me, Ranger. I know you're in there. This sounds dumb, but I can feel you in there. Please just come back to me. I'm so sorry."
Steph closed her eyes and gently wept.
xxxxxxx
Pain became more prominent, focused in his chest and left upper leg. His shoulder hurt. He was emotionally raw, a kind of hurt he was not accustomed to feeling. It was one he did not like at all. It was one thing to deal with his own emotional shit, but feeling like he was living through Stephanie's was more than he could process. All of the joyful dreams he had about Stephanie's childhood couldn't erase the bad ones. Ranger was floundering, unable to compartmentalize all of the different types of hurts and locations of pain that were causing him distress and keeping him from centering himself. This was an adversary he couldn't fight or put a bullet in.
As he started to curl up into himself, he began to feel the smallest amount of calm gentle strength infuse him. It was enough to stabilize him, to keep him from heading deeper into the black abyss that offered soothing numbness. He felt that calming sensation again, but much more strongly. It was as if a ray of sunshine forced itself out from the blackest of storm clouds, and shone right on him. It lit up a pathway for him, providing a direction to follow and restored his inner strength. Finding his ability to push all of the uncomfortable feelings and sensations back into a box, Ranger focused on his ray of light that beckoned to him.
It was hard – so damn hard – but he was determined to move further into the calming rays of the sunshine. As he drifted closer, he became aware of a strong tingly sensation in his chest slowly subsiding. He could hear a soft lub-dub, lub-dub, lub-dub. A hand clasped in his. Soft curls tickling the side of his face and neck. The pain was still there in his leg and intense, but her tear clogged voice was the best pain killer he ever had.
He heard her whisper to him 'Please just come back to me' and 'I'm sorry'. At that point, nothing else in the world mattered or was as important as getting to his Babe. He had to let her know this wasn't her fault but his. His heart rate began to climb from the effort of his struggles and with Herculean effort, he cracked open his eyes to a blinding light, only to have to shut them from discomfort. He forced them open again and fought to keep them open. He focused all of his effort on his hand that was in hers and was able to give a weak squeeze.
Stephanie felt the fingers of Ranger's hand tighten in hers for a moment. Raising her head, she thought she saw his eyelids close. She leaned back, still holding his hand and looked him over for any sign that he was waking up.
"Tank! Tank – I need you now!"
Tank rushed into the room and made his way quickly over to Steph's side. "What's the matter, Steph?"
He pale tear streaked face looked up at him filled with hope. "I think he heard me! I think he's waking up!"
He noted Ranger's rising heart rate and respiratory rate on the monitors. He looked down to see his best friend's eyes blink open, then flutter shut, then open again. His lips began to move without any sounds.
Both Steph and Tank leaned in to try and hear what Ranger was saying.
"Babe." A long pause was followed again with "Babe…..not….your fault…."
Tank grinned like the Cheshire cat and laughed.
Stephanie rolled her eyes up into her head and fainted.
-tbc-